Good morning!

I'm writing from my underground bunker in advance of the post-tropical rain which is about to strike Ireland.

There's an eerie silence outside, unusual cloud formations have appeared, and the animals are acting strangely.

All in all, these are fine conditions in which to write about a few stocks:



Footasylum (LON:FOOT)

Intention to Float on AIM

It's a new fashion retail float, so I'm sure many readers will be looking at it either as a potential purchase or as a comparison with their existing holdings.

The basics:

The Company retails "on-trend" product ranges which are predominantly aimed at 16 to 24 year old fashion-conscious customers and are sourced from an extensive stable of third party and own brands.

Similarity with Boohoo.Com (LON:BOO) in terms of age bracket but with the emphasis on footwear, obviously!

The Company operates a multi-channel model which combines a 60-strong store estate - in a variety of high street, mall and retail park locations in cities and towns throughout Great Britain - with a fast-growing eCommerce platform and a recently launched wholesale arm for distributing its own brand ranges via a network of partners. In FY17, the store estate accounted for 71 per cent. of revenue and eCommerce accounted for 29 per cent.

Next (LON:NXT) (in which I hold a long position) enjoys 47% of branded sales from its online Directory arm, so Footasylum hasn't quite achieved that sort of mix yet. But 29% online is still a significant level to have reached already.

The retail growth plans in a nutshell are to open 8-10 new stores per year, with the potential to get to at least 150 (presumably over the next decade, given that it currently has 60).

Management plans are a bit unusual: the former Chief Executive off JD Sports Fashion (LON:JD.) is scheduled to join Footasylum as Executive Chairman in June 2018. But they already have a CEO, so it looks as if there is going to be some kind of power split between her and the Exec Chair? Clarity would be helpful.

Financial results are presented as follows:

59e48fcd70dafFoot_20171016.PNG


Growth numbers are clearly quite good…

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